The Development of Topological 4-manifold Theory

Abstract

The development of topological 4-manifold theory is described in the form of a flowchart showing the interdependence among many key statements in the theory. In particular, the flowchart demonstrates how the theory crucially relies on the constructions in this book, what goes into the work of Quinn on smoothing, normal bundles, and transversality, and what is needed to deduce the famous consequences, such as the classification of closed, simply connected, topological 4-manifolds, the category preserving Poincaré conjecture, and the existence of exotic smooth structures on 4-dimensional Euclidean space. Precise statements of the results, brief indications of some proofs, and extensive references are provided.